


every star

by gallifvrey



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, Describing the Doctor and the Masters relationship in far too much detail, Gen, One-Shot, Spoilers for Episode: s12e01-02 Spyfall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-08
Updated: 2020-01-08
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:27:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22178536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gallifvrey/pseuds/gallifvrey
Summary: It is not his place to decide who lives and who dies. This is something the Master will never understand, a point where they will always disagree.They are not the same. (they are more similar than the Doctor would ever be willing to admit).
Relationships: Tenth Doctor & The Master (Simm), The Doctor & The Master (Doctor Who), Thirteenth Doctor & The Master (Dhawan), Twelfth Doctor & Missy
Comments: 2
Kudos: 50





	every star

**Author's Note:**

> The end of this contains spoilers for Spyfall pts 1 & 2\. I can't claim any real knowledge of anything before the 2005 revival so take the entire beginning part with a grain of salt. Take this entire thing with a grain of salt. I intended to write an angsty fic about Thirteen and the Master and somehow their entire life story got written. Who knows.

A long time ago, there was a boy.

This boy had a friend, and they promised each other that they would be best friends forever. They made a pact, the two of them, on some late nights where they were both lying in the fields looking up at the stars, that they would explore all of these stars one day together. That they would travel everywhere in the universe, and would be able to experience it all.

One day, as most children are to do, they were lined up in a row and brought to look at the Untempered Schism. The initiation rights for any new Time Lord. It was said that people had one of three reactions - they either became inspired, went mad, or started running.

One boy looked and what he saw made him mad. The other looked and started running. No one was ever quite sure which one happened to which boy.

Sometimes, the children were not entirely sure of that themselves.

They grew up, as children must, but remained friends. The only people on the planet who truly understood each other, some would say. They agreed - everyone else felt dull by comparison; too caught up in rules to see the wonder of the universe around them.

They had to pick names, for themselves, the legacy they wanted to carry with them into the world. One boy picked The Doctor, the other The Master. Both for similar reasons, though they would never admit that to anyone but each other.

The Doctor ended up succumbing to the urge to run and stole a TARDIS and ran away, frustrated at how slowly everyone around him seemed to move, always planning and make regulations, and never leaving the planet just to explore. He was scared, too, as he had began hearing about the great legacy that he was to one day fulfill, and figured that he was better off running around the universe, exploring.

Of course, the Master disagreed, and remained on Gallifrey instead for a while, before also leaving just to travel the universe in search of the Doctor. They could never stay apart for long.

They communicated, as many Time Lords do, through a long range telepathic connection, spanning the length of the universe. It was not always strong, and frequently not used, but it was a nice presence all the same; a reminder for the Doctor that he was not truly alone in this world, and did in the end have his friend, although they were now often trying to kill each other as well.

It was hard, for the Doctor, as his friend began to succumb to his madness, would feel the pressure the high council had on him, but he could never be able to offer him any help, as the Master would immediately refuse. They were too similar, in the end, and it would begin to hurt them.

They began to go their separate ways, the Doctor, the one who was always running, would run straight into wars and conflicts and try to save the day, helping the people who needed it most. The Doctor believed what he was doing was right- but the universe is hardly so black and white.

The Master, going mad with power, began destroying civilizations instead. Burning planets to the ground, and laughing amongst the screams of civilians echoed around him. Angry at the universe and willing to take what he wanted, no matter the cost.

Though they would not admit it, they both craved the power they felt in the end, the Master standing in the midst of destruction and reverence and the Doctor, standing in front of people who look at him as though he will be able to save their lives, if he just tries hard enough.

In the end, they are not that dissimilar, these two boys.

Occasionally, their experiences would flip, the Master, running from Gallifrey, the noises in his head, and the Doctor would occasionally look at a burning world with glee, a sense of victory, of pride.

They were never far apart, these two friends, living parallel lives, though the greatest trouble would always arise when they were together, the rest of the world around them reduced to pawns in their indefinite chess game against the other. That is why it was so surprising when the High Counsel demanded they both return to Gallifrey, to fight on the front lines of the Time War.

This war was never supposed to happen, and this war never existed in a universe where it had not always been occurring. It was unraveling the web of time itself, with the specially created weapons of the Time Lords in play. The two friends reunited before being forced to go off and win the war in different ways.

It was an endless, bloody war, and by the time the Doctor was standing in a barn in the desert, the sky had nearly gone dark with all the universes that were no longer. He is standing there, as the war rages on around him, endless and bloody with too many sacrifices and he knows what he needs to do, knows what, in this universe, must have always happened. After all, the time lines converge to one spot, and then there is darkness. This moment has been forever prophesied.

He stands in this barn and the wind is picking up, he can smell the berries from the fields of Arcadia and feel the sand hitting his face, taste the saltiness as some lands in his mouth, and he thinks he can hear singing from the capitol and he presses the button.

_How does it feel?_ the Master screams in his head the moment afterwards, just realizing what was done and the Doctor, the Doctor screams too, the pain too much until he wakes in his TARDIS, floating over nothingness. The universe is quiet now, the stars and galaxies are back where they should be. Everything is right, except the in his head there is nothing but silence.

He spends days yelling out into the universe for anyone, any Time Lord that is listening, for the Master, _please, Master, I need you to be there, please you can’t all be gone, please._

He screams until his head is weak with the effort and pushes himself farther, pushes himself into a regeneration with all the effort and his last thoughts are good, I couldn’t live with myself like this anyway.

He finds a new home, on planet Earth, with new, human friends. It is not a substitute, no one else could ever come near to that, but it keeps him busy, keeps him occupied, even as he is reminded time and time again why it is best that he stay away. Human lives are ever so fragile after all.

It should be exciting then, the day these two long lost friends are reunited, but the Doctor is trapped at the end of the world and this new body of the Master’s is filled with madness, as the High Counsel had stuffed his mind with a never ending drum beat to make sure he would bring them back from the brink of war.

The Master, filled with power and madness, and the Doctor, desperately trying to stop him, and always succeeding, just like old times again, after all.

A year here and there, a year that was not, the Master insisting that they were not that different and the Doctor, looking at the terrors inflicted by him, and insisting that they were not, while knowing deep inside his hearts that they were. _The man who can turn an army around at the mention of his name._

Then, a different face, a different name to match the change in body and she is Missy now, not the Master, but still as willing to rule the universe and stand tall in fields where millions are dead. More people dead, an army of Cybermen built from the bodies of innocent people, gifted to the Doctor with a plea.

_I need you to know we're not so different. I need my friend back._

This army would be able to stop the worst of the universe from being able to succeed, allow only those who are right to ever win.

_Every battle, every war, every invasion. From now on, you decide the outcome._

For a moment, he imagines it, being able to travel around the universe, how much good he could do, Time Lord Victorious, the killer of his own kind, the Oncoming Storm. The universe would know his name, he could stand tall while millions died in front of him, but it was right this time, because they were evil, were hurting others. He could master the universe.

_What's the matter, Mister President? Don't you trust yourself?_

In the end, their differences are exactly that, the Doctor runs, the Master fights. The Doctor rejecting the army, claims that he is just a traveler, a madman in a box, passing through, helping out, learning. It is not his place to decide who lives and who dies. This is something the Master will never understand, a point where they will always disagree.

They are not the same. ( _they are more similar than the Doctor would ever be willing to admit_ ).

They meet again, eventually, as they are destined to do. Missy not able to run from her crimes any longer, on the execution block, but how could he ever kill her, it would be worse than killing himself. They are not the only ones, any longer (t _hough in many ways they are, have always been the only ones, the only ones that matter and understand each other, it doesn’t matter that Gallifrey was gone, is back, now that they have each other_ ), her death still would feel like the death of the universe, to him.

He rescues her, saves her from her death and in turn keeps her trapped in a vault with him on Earth as he waits, trapped with her. Begins teaching her about morality in an impossible effort to make her realize why some of the things she does is wrong, and how her actions have consequences.

Maybe, maybe they can one day still travel the stars together, when all this is over. He can have his oldest friend back.

_Every star in the universe, we were going to see them all. But he was too busy burning them. I don't think she ever saw anything._

It isn’t purely selfless, to make another person better, he looks in her face and looks at her actions and sees himself, sees the desperation to bend the universe to her will and the willingness to do whatever it takes to do what she thinks is right.

_She's the only person that I've ever met who's even remotely like me._

_So more than anything you want her to be good?_

And he does, he does so badly because maybe there is hope for him yet, if she can become good and she can see the beauty in the universe then maybe his cause is not lost, maybe, maybe, maybe,

She ends up betraying him, in the end, the two friends dying on a Mondasian Space Ship inching towards a black hole. Of course they make it out, the universe could not lose its Doctor and its Master, but for a moment they die peacefully together, for a moment there is complete stillness.

The Doctor survives this, because how could she not and she is born again and traveling on new adventures and making new friends, she has firmly moved on. She is doing what she does best, running away from her past and straight to the future, for if she runs fast enough it can’t catch up.

Of course, the only one who could keep up with her in any way finds her, the Master, on a falling plane, with a plan to take over the entire universe, and if she was not horrified and feeling like her entire world had been torn from her, she would nearly be nostalgic for the old times. The two of them cycling through the universe, always one step ahead and one step behind.

But the Master is there now, and their connection is back, she can hear him in her head again and there is rage, glee, excitement at her finally discovering who he is, how she can no longer hide (she finds it rather amusing, in that case, that she spends the next few hours very literally running and hiding from him, to avoid her untimely demise).

They are too similar, in the end, and when she beckons him to meet her at the top of the Eiffel Tower at night he does, and they are finally able to really talk to each other. The Doctor, desperately just wanting him to tell her his plan so she can stop him, prevent the needless deaths of others, but he is more than willing to string her along, taunting her instead, watching her run after him, _how else would I get your attention?_

He mentions something about Gallifrey and for a moment she can’t breathe and convinces herself that it must be a lie, a disguise, but later when she is alone she can’t help but think about how she hasn’t felt the mental brush of another Time Lord in so long, even when traveling near where Gallifrey is. Thinks about how she left them in rage after what they did to her and didn’t plan to return.

She lands on the Hills of Arcadia and when she opens the door, the wind picks up, she can smell the berries from the bushes and feel the sand on her face, the salty taste in her mouth, stings against her eyes.

( _he did not, in his fit of rage, think to smell the berries, think to listen to the children singing_ )

She looks at the shattered dome of the Capitol ( _they used to talk about how they would one day be in there, the two of them living amongst the highest of the Time Lords. The glass had looked impenetrable when they were children, instead it shattered as soon as the missile hit it_ ), the tattered remains of the city beneath it.

There is no singing ( _there was singing but he didn’t care, fueled only by rage, he knew he was done when it was quiet_ ), it was just quiet.

The Doctor lands on top of the hills of Arcadia and while she is looking at the world she loved ( _hated, loved, both one and the same_ ), and in her mind she is pressing a button, in her mind she is not pressing a button.

She reaches out to him, hoping he is listening ( _he is always listening, has been waiting for this moment since he told her_ ), screams into his mind,

_Why?_

Feels a sense of smugness in return, a condescending smile,

_Oh Doctor,_ he replies, _you did this first. I only learned from the best. I needed you to see we’re not that different after all._

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on tumblr! gallifvrey.tumblr.com!


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